It’s strange, how I often think I over-share, that I’m far too much of an open book, that I have no real private problems or thoughts. But then I find myself lying here in a warm bath — as I do every morning when I’m here — thinking about all the things I wish I could talk to someone about. The things that I’m ashamed of, or that I cannot find a string of linguistically sensible sounds to express in a way that do them justice, or that I simply do not want to share. Perhaps it is precisely because I am normally so open, that it feels foreign to *want* to keep something to myself.
Yet despite this desire for walls around my thoughts and feelings (my innermost mechanisms, as you would put it), I crave the intimacy of human connection. The kind that comes only from sharing the rawest of emotions, the most sensitive of thoughts. It’s a terrifying prospect, no? To be known so utterly well by someone that they understand you better than you understand yourself, for they have all the knowledge about your past and present and thoughts and feelings that you do, with the added bonus of a third party perspective. To be known in a manner which you never dreamed would be possible. To be known in a such a way that you do not need to ever be alone again, for no matter where they are, you know they would listen and understand— or even if they do not understand, they would not judge you.
I lie here, and I wonder. Imagine someone knowing I wished people would offer hugs more often because I think that although I’d decline most of the time, I would accept every now and then, and accepting is easier for me than to ask for one myself. Imagine someone knowing the details of what I went through the weeks surrounding my surgery, the feelings I’ve been having about those memories and the fear of what’s to come. Imagine someone knowing the cues I give off that indicate whether or not I’m mentally present at any given time (sometimes it’s so subtle I don’t even know if I’m there or not until later). Imagine someone knowing where each and every scar I have came from. Imagine someone knowing the full story of what happened with my parents growing up, the home dynamic I lived with, all the things they did and said to me, the complex way I’ve been irreversibly traumatized by them yet still love them so deeply I call them nearly every day. Imagine someone knowing how difficult moving out was for me, despite externally having behaved as though I had everything together. Imagine someone knowing the ugly and terrifying way I fall apart sometimes, how gravity wins and I find myself shaking on the floor, crying and whispering things to myself and begging the world for a way out. Imagine someone knowing about that horrible horrible horrible thing I did as a very young child that I know was simply a case of a kid not knowing any better but which haunts me regardless. Imagine someone knowing the story of how I got addicted to cutting and various other forms of self injury, and the events involving it that I sometimes remember, like getting hit by a truck.
Imagine someone knowing you so well that you could call them any time, whether it’s because you need help or because you don’t want to be alone or because you just miss them, and you know they’ll pick up if they can and that you will know them just as well as they know you.
Sounds like a pipe dream to me. Every time I get remotely close to someone I end up being too much. They get to know too many details about me and then they leave because I am not loveable. Not in my entirety. Even while trying so hard to be a better person over the years. I’m just, me.
